According to the latest statistics of “World Glacier Inventory” and “Glacier Inventory of China”, the glaciers cover an area of 15,865,756 km2 globally, wherein 96.6% of the glaciers are located in the Antarctica and Greenland, followed by North America (1.7%) and Asia (1.2%). Glaciers are closely related to the activities of human being. The changes of advance and retreat of the glaciers has a much closer relationship with the people who live in the mountain regions.
Glaciers are the indicator of the climate changes. Under the trend of global warming, glaciers tend to accelerate in retreat. The speeding up of the glacier melting has a great influence on the sea level rise, local water circulation, and water resources accessibility. Nowadays, methods of researching the variation of the glacier storage (volume) mainly include the traditional measurement method, the statistical formula method, glacier topographic survey, and remote sensing monitoring. However, these methods are all based on the research of the variation of the glacier storage (volume), without discussing the principle of melting based on the physical process of the glacier melting. Moreover, most research methods are time-consuming, costly, laborious, and prone to be limited by field conditions. The present invention relates to the ice melting tests under laboratory conditions. Thus, the present invention is simple, practical, time-saving, and labor-saving, with reliable and accurate results.
The melting of ice is a common physical phenomenon in nature and is a heat transfer process in an unstable state. Moreover, the phase transition occurs along with the melting process. There are a lot of factors that affect the rate of ice melting. Intuitively speaking, main factors are the temperature, the airflow, the humidity in the ambient environment, the surface area of the ice, the pressure impacted on the ice (air pressure or solid pressure), the impurity in the ice, etc.
Manners of the glacier melting include the melting on the ice surface, the melting inside the ice, and the melting under the ice. Among others, the melting on the ice surface happens most of the time. The study of the glacier melting is an important way to analyze and predict the advance and retreat of the glacier. The study is also the basis to understand the feeding condition of the river, to exploit and utilize the glacier resources. By the quantitative simulation of the processes of runoff (melting) and confluence of the glacier region, a theoretical basis can be provided for the management of the variation of water resource of the glacier, glacier flood control, glacier hydroenergy utilization, etc. In addition, the quantitative simulation is critical for glacier kinetic study, including the understanding of the water flow motion inside the glacier, the distribution of pressure inside the glacier, the sliding and jumping of the glacier, the debris of the broken glacial lake, etc. The quantitative evaluation of the variation of the glacier is critical to the management of water resources in the arid region or arid drainage basin, the rising of the sea level, and the prevention of natural disasters caused by glacier.